Thistle-Head Aku
by KidatHeart5
Summary: This is my spoof of "Daisy-Head Mayzie", Samurai Jack style. When Aku mysteriously has a thistle on his head, he tries to find an explanation. After he makes a deal with an agent who promises him fame, Aku is catapulted into a life of adoration and fortune. But will he recognize the signs of danger the weed imposes before it's too late?


_It's hard to believe such a thing could be true. And I hope such a thing never happens to you. But it happened, they say, to powerful Aku._

_It happened like this. He was sleeping one day in his bed at his home in his usual way…_

Slowly, he woke up and rose from his bed. He gave a yawn before climbing out of bed. He drudged all the way from his bedroom to his chair. Once he sat down, he pressed on the intercom button underneath the right arm of his chair. He spoke into it, "Chamberlain, have my usual coffee made, but triple the amount of grounds. It's one of those days."

"One of those days" usually came after he had yet another fight with his hated enemy, Samurai Jack. Though most of their quarrels ended in stalemates, the wretched samurai did not give up so easily, especially since he had a magic sword that was capable of destroying Aku. More than anything, the demon feared that blade. It was first forged when he was razing the Emperor's kingdom. He and the Emperor fought until the Samurai Lord trapped him within the earth. During a solar eclipse, Aku had managed to escape his prison and terrorized all of the earth after that. Yet, there was that one constant obstacle that Aku tangled with over and over again.

Samurai Jack had an iron will much like his father's…and perseverance to match. They were so alike that they were thorns in Aku's side. What he would give to wipe that troublesome warrior off the face of the earth, the demon's empire. Aku had spent countless years reshaping the world in his image, and he was not going to let Jack have a chance to erase everything the demon lord made. Aku had suffered for far too long and he was going make sure Jack would endure that agony tenfold. The samurai had to pay for all of the wrongs he and his father placed on Aku.

Just then, his head felt itchy. Aku scratched it, but the itch wouldn't go away. He thought, _Cursed itch. Why won't it cease?_ He thought of the possibility that Jack put something in his sword that infected Aku during their last showdown. When the itch seemed to be affected by his hateful thoughts about Jack, Aku decided to think no more about him. He kept scratching and scratching, hoping that the itch would be satisfied. He was so caught up in scratching that he was surprised when he heard "Ahem!"

He became still and his eyes moved to his right to see an alien barista next to a wagon with a coffee cup large enough to fit in Aku's hand. He slowly said, embarrassed that he was caught in the act, "Oh. Um…thank you." He reached for the cup and added in a low, quick voice, "You didn't see me scratching my head." The barista shook her head as if to say that she understood. Before she could invoke his wrath, she quickly dashed out of there.

When he was taking a sip of his coffee, the intercom buzzed and a voice said, "_Lord Aku, your presence is requested._" Annoyed, the demon swallowed his drink and groaned, "If I don't have my coffee first, forests will burn to the ground." The voice replied, "_Yes, my master._" Aku found that the coffee soothed his itch, so he drank it all in his own sweet time. When he was finished, he quickly teleported himself to the summoning tower.

The ground shook and rumbled beneath the alien family, who had just recently immigrated. Moments later, a tower of black ooze shot up from the pit below. The ooze soon morphed into the Supreme Master of the planet Earth: Aku. He said in a low, intimidating voice, "Why have you called forth the Great and Powerful Aku?" The father was about to say something, but he paused when his wife tried to shush her giggling children. "Children!" she whispered. "Do not be rude to the master of this planet."

Aku was curious about why the children were giggling, so he demanded, "What do you think is so funny, underage jesters?" Before they could answer, the father blocked them and answered nervously, "We're sorry. We've just immigrated here because we seek a safer home and this one is suitable for our needs." Aku rolled his eyes and remarked quietly, "Like many of the sob stories I've heard before." The mother then asked, "We just need to ask: are we supposed to wear plants on our head or is that reserved for the leader of this world?" Aku was confused and offended at the same time and asked indignantly, "Why would you dare ask such a thing?" Before either of the parents could stop her, the small alien girl pointed and cried, "Because you have one on your head!"

The demon was stunned by the response and almost immediately shot back, "What?!"

_Then he felt a small twitch on the top of his head. So Aku looked up and he almost dropped dead. Something peculiar was scratching like thorns. A thistle had sprouted right between his horns! _

_Beside him was standing his faithful chamberlain. "It looks like a thistle up there on your noggin!" he remarked. "It doesn't make sense. Why, it couldn't be so. A noggin's no place for a thistle to grow."_

_Then, up spoke the Martian boy, gifted from birth, who studied every single thing about Earth. "It's a very odd place to be sprouting an Earth weed," he said coolly. "But, nevertheless, one's growing on him indeed."_

Aku could see that the surprise was making such a fuss in the room. Until now, he never felt conscious about what people would say about him. He knew they either respected him or utterly hated him. It was as simple as that. But for a weed to distort his public image, he wasn't about to take that chance. He quickly covered his thistle and ordered, "Don't look at me!" With that, he quickly retreated into the pit.

When he reappeared back in his lair, he resolved to eliminate the weed on his head once and for all. He sharpened his two long fingers to resemble clippers. He snipped at the thistle, only for it to regenerate itself. Aku frustratingly tried to clip the weed from his head, but to no avail. He looked down to see the clipped thistles reabsorb into his body. He sighed in defeat and decided to stay in his lair. _If I can't get rid of this accursed plant_, he thought, _I'll just stay here where no one will…_

In dread, he remembered the alien family that did see his thistle. In panic, he waved in front of his screen to scry on the family, especially the children. His worries were confirmed when the teenage alien boy was on the web network. The boy announced, "Hey, look what's happening to our lord of doom! Thistle-Head Aku! He's bursting in bloom!"

He showed a picture of Aku with the thistle on his head. Until that moment, Aku didn't realize how ridiculous he looked with a weed on his head. When he heard crowds of people laughing through the screen, Aku only glared at the scene while his face turned red.

_There were disbelievers who were quite skeptic. "Such nonsense!" they exclaimed. "Somebody here is playing a trick. No plant on his head could pop out of thin air. You know that a thistle could never grow there." The boy differed, "But I am telling you, I saw the thing rise right out of his head with my very own eyes. He'll give it a yank if it's really all lies."_

Aku couldn't take any more of this, so he turned from the screen and grunted, "I've had quite enough of this foolishness talk." He grabbed for the thistle, but it ducked from his grasp. "What the…" he said. "Hold still, you small infernal stalk!" When he did grab it, he tried to pull it from his head. It pained him so much that he decided to loop the thistle under his foot and pull it from there.

Alas, the stubborn plant remained anchored to his head. Just as he was giving it one last pull, he heard the teenager say, "If that thing's stuck, it will be giving him pains. I'll bet that those roots go way down in his brains." Then, he began chanting, "Thistle-Head, Thistle-Head, Thistle-Head Aku!" More joined in and soon, the sound was equivalent to a volcano erupting. Aku felt aggravated by this and he threatened, "Silence! If you don't stop the taunts and sass, I will forcibly wipe out each and every class!"

His threats fell on deaf ears and the taunting still continued. Defeated yet amazed, Aku remarked, "I've been on this earth many years. Maybe more. But nothing like this has ever happened before." While the chanting was still going on, he thought about his options.

_"__I need to do something," he said as he stroked his beard. "Wait. Dr. Sophie! She's my physician. She'll be able to help me!"_

He teleported all the way to her office, but while he was doing so, he kept hearing the endless taunts of the countless crowds that knew about his thistle.

_"__Thistle-Head, Thistle-Head, Thistle-Head Aku! Thistle-Head, Thistle-Head, Thistle-Head Aku! Thistle-Head, Thistle-Head, Thistle-Head Aku! Thistle-Head, Thistle-Head, Thistle-Head Aku!"_


End file.
